There's a new outfit in town that promises to help make
Arkansas a bigger player in the entertainment industry.

Anita Waxman and Arkansan Elizabeth Williams, Broadway producers,
have formed a partnership between their New York company and a Little
Rock investment firm to help promote and produce more entertainment in
the state under the Waxman Williams/SHI title.

Sea Heritage Investments LLC of Little Rock, run by Steve Parks, is
the second party in the deal, behind Waxman Williams Entertainment LP of
New York.

A spokeswoman for the new company, Marion Kalm, said Waxman
Williams/SHI will operate from an office in the Donaghey Building in
downtown Little Rock.

"It's an exciting thing not only from an entertainment
standpoint but from an economic development standpoint as well,"
Kahn said. "We're talking about expanding an industry that now
offers very few jobs in central Arkansas."

Along with a variety of television and film projects both in
production and in development at its Little Rock office, the new company
has partnered with the Arkansas Repertory Theatre to present
developmental productions of new plays there for eventual rollout around
the world.

The first production for The Rep is already planned: an adaptation
of the hit sitcom "Designing Women" by Linda Bloodworth
Thomason. Word is that the play's producers are now in talks with
the show's original cast (Dixie Carter, Delta Burke, Jean Smart,
Annie Potts and Meshach Taylor) to star in the production. The play will
be launched at The Rep and--if all goes as hoped--will have a tour and a
run on Broadway.

Several documentaries are in postproduction in Little Rock,
including a series chronicling the discovery and exploration of
shipwrecks off the coast of Panama.

COPYRIGHT 2006 Journal Publishing, Inc.
No portion of this article can be reproduced without the express written permission from the copyright holder.